The First Year Leadership League, a committee for the Student Alumni Leadership Council (SALC), held “State Day” to celebrate the birth of Iowa State University.
SALC celebrated with carnival food, games and prizes on Central Campus.
Mackenzy Ruff, SALC president, said all four committees of SALC were helping at the event, including Homecoming Central Committee, Senior Class Council, Cyclone Alley and First Year Leadership League.
“We have a Carnival and Gold theme instead of Cardinal and Gold,” Ruff said. “So we have hot dogs for the theme, popcorn and then we have apples and cookies and water as well.”
Ruff said they also had games they had giveaways in exchange for playing.
“We have plinko, high striker and trivia and fishbowl frenzy,” Ruff said. “To also go along with the theme, we’re giving away a goldfish, so like a real-life goldfish some lucky winner will get.”
During the event, they also announced the homecoming theme for 2025, which is “Lights Camera Cyclones.”
Clarissa Boyd, the SALC advisor, said it was exciting preparing for this event and her role is more of the development side to help students gain leadership skills and valuable event planning skills.
“It’s just really exciting and empowering to watch students develop their skills and put together an event that comes to a final product,” Boyd said.
Boyd said SALC has been doing this event since 2019.
“It goes along with a lot of our mission that we have to celebrate and help students celebrate loyalty and tradition to Iowa State,” Boyd said.
Luke Potter, a freshman studying political science and member of the First Year Leadership League, said he got involved because his mom works for the Alumni Center and brought up the opportunity.
“So far, its just been great,” Potter said. “So many good opportunities in kind of learning how to throw an event like this, learning how to work with other people, collaborate well, some good leadership and networking opportunities.”
Potter was working one of the games and said he was having a blast.
“I’m very passionate about our prizes, we have some really good stuff this year, and I would really like them to win something,” Potter said. “I want to see my community and my people win some cool stuff.”
Sydney Septer, a junior in agricultural communication and agriculture and rural policy, attended the event.
“I like the sense of community this event brings,” Septer said. “There’s so many students from all different majors just coming together and celebrating alumni.”
For more information on events like these, visit the SALC website or the ISU Alumni website.
